Graylog vs VMware Aria Operations for Logs comparison

Graylog and VMware are both solutions in the Log Management category. Graylog is ranked #15 with an average rating of 7.0, while VMware is ranked #12 with an average rating of 8.2. Graylog holds a 6.5% mindshare in Log Management, compared to VMware’s 1.3% mindshare. Additionally, 95% of Graylog users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of VMware users who would recommend it.

Graylog

Read 21 Graylog reviews

9,223 Views
5,549 Comparison Views

95% willing to recommend

VMware Aria Operations for ...

Read 28 VMware Aria Operations for Logs reviews

2,165 Views
840 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

Graylog

VMware Aria Operations for ...

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 9, 2024

VMware Aria Operations for Logs and Graylog are products in the log management sector. VMware Aria Operations for Logs appears more favorable in deployment and customer service, while Graylog demonstrates competitiveness based on pricing and features.

Features: VMware Aria Operations is noted for comprehensive integration capabilities, seamless data aggregation, and in-depth analysis. Graylog offers open-source flexibility, real-time analysis capabilities, and the ability to extensively customize and scale solutions. Graylog also shows adaptability in complex environments.

Room for Improvement: VMware Aria Operations could improve reporting tools, enhance configuration processes, and provide a more intuitive interface. Graylog users highlight the need for better technical documentation, quicker support response times, and smoother installation experiences. Graylog receives more specific feedback on documentation compared to VMware’s usability focus.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: VMware Aria Operations provides an easier deployment process and consistent customer support. Graylog is seen as requiring more technical expertise for setup, with variable support experiences. VMware's team is perceived as more responsive.

Pricing and ROI: VMware Aria Operations has higher initial costs but offers value through its features and stability, contributing to positive ROI. Graylog's pricing models are competitive but may need further investments for customization, influencing ROI differently, yet it's considered cost-effective for scalable deployments.

To learn more, read our detailed Graylog vs. VMware Aria Operations for Logs Report (Updated: June 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Graylog vs. VMware Aria Operations for Logs

June 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Graylog

Ranking in Log Management

15th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.2

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

VMware Aria Operations for ...

Ranking in Log Management

12th

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of July 2025, in the Log Management category, the mindshare of Graylog is 6.5%, up from 5.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Aria Operations for Logs is 1.3%, up from 1.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Log Management

Featured Reviews

Ivan Kokalovic

DevOps Engineer at Proton Technologies

Facilitates backend service monitoring with efficient log retrieval and API flexibility

Graylog is valuable because it bridges technical knowledge to non-technical teams, presenting complex backend processes in a simple timeline. It boosts the knowledge of sales and customer support teams by allowing them to see the backend operations without needing to read the code. Its API is flexible for visualization, and its powerful search engine efficiently handles large volumes of log data. Moreover, its stability, fast search capabilities, and compatibility with languages like ANSI SQL enhance its utility in IT infrastructure.

Read full review

LarsChristensen

Advisory Solution Consultant at ServiceNow

Efficient troubleshooting with precise log filtering and an easy setup

The tool could benefit from improved filter settings and dashboarding. While there are dashboards available, they are often created by community members and may not work after updates. It would be beneficial to have a roadmap for these dashboards to ensure consistent functionality. It would also be advantageous if the tool could process even large amounts of data faster, though this may be more related to data movement challenges rather than the software itself.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The Graylog features that have proven to be most beneficial for our data analysis in particular are that we tend to use it as a big data store, so we have the correlation rules that, if something matches under certain conditions, it raises an alarm."

"Real-time UDP/GELF logging and full text-based searching."

"I like the correlation and the alerting."

"We're using the Community edition, but I know that it has really good dashboarding and alerts."

"It is used as a log manager/SIEM. It provides visibility into the infrastructure and security related events."

"I am very proud of how very stable the solution is."

"Storing logs in Elasticsearch means log retrieval is extremely fast, and full text search is available by default."

"Everything stands out as valuable, including the fact that I can quantify and qualify the logs, create pipelines and process the logs in any way I like, and create charts or data maps."

More Graylog pros

"The interface of the solution is good."

"Log Insight correlates with the VMware product log. It can assemble the logs you want, making it easier to find the output, incident, or keyword you want to search."

"What I like is that you can have different storage locations for different applications."

"I like the interface."

"It is a highly stable solution...It is a highly scalable solution."

"The system's management and its alerts are the most valuable aspects of the solution."

"We are using it because we have a VMware product. It has its own built in dashboards for VMware products, and that's a good thing."

"The ability to narrow into a specific time to filter heavy hitters and anomalies is extremely valuable."

More VMware Aria Operations for Logs pros

Cons

"Elasticsearch recommendations for tuning could be better. Graylog doesn't have direct support for running the system inside of Kubernetes, so it can be challenging to fill in the gaps and set up containers in a way that is both performant and stable."

"Over six months, I had two similar issues where searches were performed on field "messages". It exhausted all the memory of the ES node causing an ES crash and a Graylog halt."

"When it comes to configuring the processing pipeline, writing the rules can be very tedious, especially since the documentation isn't extensive on how the functions provided for these rules work."

"The infrastructure cost is the main issue. I like the rest. If the infrastructure costs could be lower, it would be fantastic."

"We ran into problems with Elasticsearch throwing a circuit-breaking exception due to field data size being too large. It turned out that the heap size directly impacted this size in a high-throughput environment, causing unexplained instability in Graylog. We were able to troubleshoot on the Elasticsearch size, but we should have been able to reference some minimum requirements for Graylog to know that our settings weren't sufficient."

"Graylog needs to improve their authentication. Also, the fact that Graylog displays logs from the top down is just ridiculous."

"When it comes to configuring the processing pipeline, writing the rules can be very tedious, especially since the documentation isn't extensive on how the functions provided for these rules work."

"With technical support, you are on your own without an enterprise license."

More Graylog cons

"Log retention should have more options for user control."

"The tool does not provide a centralized pane for monitoring."

"The solution should be more user-friendly. The user interface and dashboard could be simplified."

"Integration with other vendors is something that could be improved, they could add more vendors."

"I don't use the solution on a day to day basis, so I'm not sure what specifically can be improved."

"What I'd like to improve in vRealize Log Insight is the licensing model. VMware provides vRealize Log Insight along with the VMware Cloud Foundation, but customers who would like to go for the native VMware would have to procure vRealize Log Insight separately. Today, vRealize Log Insight is offered on two different licenses, one is based on the number of VMs, and the other is based on the number of physical codes on the machine. If VMware can provide a bundle offer for customers who procure more than ten licenses, where you can have an option to run, for example, three hundred machines on vRealize Log Insight with no extra cost, this would encourage more people to adopt the solution. What I'd like to see in the next release of vRealize Log Insight is for a cloud option to be available, which would be a pay-as-you-go licensing model that would allow me to pick and choose what I'll monitor. For example, I have one thousand and three hundred critical servers, and the seven hundred servers for basic development, I don't want to monitor on vRealize Log Insight today, so I should be able to pick what I need to monitor on the solution and only pay for that specific instance. If VMware can apply these changes, it would help VMware customers to procure more or adopt more of vRealize Log Insight even in smaller projects."

"The solution isn't user-friendly for admins."

"VMware Aria Operations for Logs is not a cost-effective tool. Additionally, it is expensive, especially given the current economic conditions in Turkey."

More VMware Aria Operations for Logs cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's open source and free. They have a paid version, but we never looked into that because we never needed the features of the paid version."

"If you want something that works and do not have the money for Splunk or QRadar, take Graylog."

"Consider Enterprise support if you have atypical needs or setup requirements."

"Graylog is a free open-source solution. The free version has a capacity limitation of 2 GB daily, if you want to go above this you have to purchase a license."

"Having paid official support is wise for projects."

"You get a lot out-of-the-box with the non-enterprise version, so give it a try first."

"I use the free version of Graylog."

"It's an open-source solution that can be used free of charge."

More Graylog pricing and cost advice

"Pricing could always be lower. If it were free, I would be more satisfied."

"The licensing cost for vRealize Log Insight is a little higher, so in terms of cost, it all depends upon what kind of environment you have. If you have a complete virtualized environment, or at least you're using a ninety-five percent virtualized environment, then vRealize Log Insight will play a very good role because it is a VMware component, so it has very tight integration with other VMware components and systems. This means you don't have to procure any other monitoring and management tool, and you don't need a separate automation tool. vRealize Log Insight will have an upper hand if your environment is purely virtualized on VMware. If you're using a mix of physical and virtual components, for example, a 50:50 ratio, then you need to have a third-party component to manage overall monitoring."

"I rate the product's price a six on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive."

"I think it is a reasonably priced product."

"Pricing is good because it is part of the suite package. It comes in a bundle for us."

"The pricing has been updated recently."

"The product's price is reasonable, but when it comes to SQL licensing, it's a bit expensive."

"The license cost for any other monitoring tool is too high compared to this product."

More VMware Aria Operations for Logs pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

17%

Comms Service Provider

10%

Government

University

Computer Software Company

14%

Financial Services Firm

12%

Government

12%

Manufacturing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Graylog?

The product is scalable. The solution is stable.

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Graylog?

I am not familiar with the pricing details of Graylog, as I was not responsible for that aspect. It was determined that we didn't need an enterprise plan, which is more suited for clients with less...

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What needs improvement with Graylog?

An improvement I would suggest is in Graylog's user interface, such as allowing for font size adjustments. A potential enhancement could be the integration with Ollama to run large language models ...

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What do you like most about vRealize Log Insight?

The events are notably more descriptive, aiding in security and event analysis. We've also integrated Sky Collector, providing valuable insights and solutions for troubleshooting.

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for vRealize Log Insight?

The cost of using VMware Aria Operations for Logs was very high, around two to three million dollars, although the exact figure is uncertain. The price was proving to be too much, especially with t...

See all answers

What needs improvement with vRealize Log Insight?

VMware Aria Operations for Logs is not a cost-effective tool. Changing any telemetry requires creating a new template, such as changes to the VM disk size. Always having to create a new template ma...

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Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Graylog

June 2025

Download Graylog product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware Aria Operations for Logs

June 2025

Download VMware Aria Operations for Logs product report

Also Known As

Graylog2

vRealize Log Insight

Overview

Graylog is purpose-built to deliver the best log collection, storage, enrichment, and analysis. Graylog is:

Considerably faster analysis speeds.
More robust and easier-to-use analysis platform.
Simpler administration and infrastructure management.
Lower cost than alternatives.
Full-scale customer service.
No expensive training or tool experts required.

Graylog

Manage data at scale with centralized log management, deep operational visibility and intelligent analytics for troubleshooting and auditing across private, hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

VMware

Sample Customers

Blue Cross Blue Shield, eBay, Cisco, LinkedIn, SAP, King.com, Twilio, Deutsche Presse-Agentur

Wildlands Adventure Zoo, Medic Mobile, IBM, Seventy Seven Energy, Baystate Health, Osis, Oxford University, Columbia University, Siemens, Cardinal Health, Ashdod Port, Vasakronan, Sydney Adventist Hospital, University of Derby

Buyer's Guide

Graylog vs. VMware Aria Operations for Logs

June 2025

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Find out what your peers are saying about Graylog vs. VMware Aria Operations for Logs and other solutions. Updated: June 2025.

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